Because
by Faulty Cameras
Summary: Because she was Taylor and he was Ryan and they were like peanut butter and jelly. They were good separate but, in the end, they were always better together.


Disclaimer: I don't own any part of The OC.

A/N-I thought of this idea randomly when I, uh, should have been studying for exams. Which if what I should have been doing instead of writing this. Oh well. I'm kind of like this oneshot a lot, so I hope that everyone else does too. Thanks to Meg for editing for me.

* * *

Taylor caught Ryan's eye and smiled at him, gaining a smile in return. She looked away from him after that, pretty sure that her smile would grow even wider if she continued to stare at him across the room. This would inevitably lead to her giving away their secret and they weren't just ready to do that.

She couldn't help but look at her husband though.

She smiled just at that thought. She loved just the thought of him being her husband. It was an amazing thought and it was an amazing reality. He was her husband.

Of course no one knew that he was her husband and she was his wife, considering it was a very recent development. Recent as in one week ago. They had eloped.

She loved that they had eloped. She had never really seen herself having a large wedding when she eventually got married for real. She hadn't exactly expected to elope but that was what it had come to. And she was honestly all right with it.

They had decided not to tell anyone about it just yet. Well, there was one person who knew, but that was kind of a mandatory thing. So far they hadn't told anyone in their family.

Taylor was bursting with excitement though and she just wanted to tell everyone. Ryan had told her that she needed to wait for just a few more days. He wanted to tell everyone when they were all together at Seth and Summer's son, Jacob's third birthday party.

They were there now and still had not told anyone. Actually, Taylor had been ready to blurt it out right when they had arrived, even before they had wished Jacob a happy birthday. That was before Ryan had told her that Sandy, Kirsten, and Sophie weren't going to be arriving until later, so she had to wait.

So she just sat patiently-okay rather impatiently-waiting for them to arrive at the party.

She was honestly losing all hope of not blurting it out. It was just not in her nature to not tell people things. She always had a tendency to well, over share. This time it wasn't over sharing. It was just her being excited about being married to Ryan.

Honestly, she thought it was more because of the fact that she never thought that she and Ryan would ever get married.

They had gone their separate ways nearly ten years ago. She had gone to France, he had gone to college. They were going to see what happened with them before they really advanced any further.

Truthfully, Taylor had been waiting for him. She had thought that Ryan was 'the one' for her since the first time that they had seriously took a look at their relationship. She was in love with him and she was almost positive that there wasn't any other guy for her.

Then she had gotten the call after being in France for almost a year that had changed her mind on that.

Ryan had found someone at Berkeley. It wasn't all that serious, apparently, but he still really liked her. Apparently more than he had liked Taylor at that moment.

She had hated him for a good year. She didn't leave France like she had originally planned to do and see him for the summer. She had wanted to but had refrained. She realized that she needed to start her own life and that life was without Ryan.

She lived nearly two years without hearing from him. She certainly heard enough about him as whenever she talked to Summer, somehow his name would be brought up. As much as Taylor would deny it, Summer knew she wanted to hear about what was going on with him.

When she heard that he broke up with said girlfriend from Berkeley because she had been cheating on him, well she almost packed her bags and left immediately. She had somehow controlled herself and waited a couple of month's before leaving France again. And she had a good reason too, so it didn't just seem as if she was stalking him or something. No, Seth and Summer had gotten engaged and Summer had asked Taylor to be her maid of honor. She needed her there with her, to help with planning the wedding. Taylor found a job quickly enough and was able to move back there.

She would be fooling herself if she didn't admit that one of the reasons was because she wanted to see where she stood with Ryan. Because truly, she loved France a lot and normally wouldn't have left just to help with a wedding, when that was something that truthfully could have been done over the phone.

And by the look on Ryan's face when he saw her at the engagement party, the first time she had seen him in three and a half years, she knew that it was worth it. Even though nothing really advanced during the next year.

Not that Taylor hadn't tried. Oh she had definitely tried. She would consider herself insane if she hadn't tried to win his affections once again.

Nothing had advanced. Apparently Ryan was tired of jumping into relationships. So he wanted to take it slowly, being friends or something ridiculous like that. Taylor highly doubted that they of all people could be friends and not have anything happen between the two of them, but she agreed.

Because she knew that he loved her and he just needed to take time to work that all out. So she let him.

They got together, on the night of Seth and Summer's wedding. Or rather before the wedding. Not that anyone knew that anything had happened before the wedding. That was their little secret. They had exchanged a smile during the ceremony and both had known what the smile meant. They were both happy.

And they continued on like that. They loved each other and Taylor had been right in saying that he was the one for her. Except her only problem was that Ryan refused to realize it.

She had tried dropping hints like crazy. A year after they had gotten together and moved into an apartment together, she had mentioned something about marriage. He had shrugged it off then. When Seth and Summer had their first child soon after that, she had stated how nice it would be for them to have a family together.

After the birth of Seth and Summer's second child, she had said something again. She had wanted him to get the hint. They had been together for nearly three years and she was more than ready to get married.

That was when he broke the news that he didn't want to get married. She had been surprised at that fact. He didn't want a family. He was fine just being in a relationship with her, just the two of them

Taylor had realized that there had been some sort of other reason. She hadn't been sure what, and then she figured it out when she found him in their room, looking at an old picture of Marissa and him together.

She was pretty sure that he still loved Marissa. She had herself convinced that he had only wanted to start a family with Marissa, had only wanted to get married to her. She had wanted to be wrong, she really had been. But he hadn't denied it when she brought it up, though he hadn't agreed with it either. Still, it was enough for Taylor. She needed a break.

She spent six months away from him. It turned out to be the worst six months of her life. And she knew why.

Because she was Taylor and he was Ryan and they were like peanut butter and jelly. They were good separate but, in the end, they were always better together.

He didn't deny it either. In fact, he encouraged it when he picked her up from the airport upon her arrival home and kissed her in the middle of the airport like she had never been kissed before.

Even though they had only been apart for six months, a lot had changed for them. They were looking at their relationship more maturely, both finally having grown up. They both finally realized that this was their last time of getting back together.

Taylor knew it was going to last.

Their maturity wasn't the only thing that had changed though. Ryan had brought a young boy into his home. His name was Isaac and he was much like the young version of Ryan, though only 13 and a lot more frightened and scared than Ryan seemed to be. Ryan had taken him in, paying forward the kindness that Sandy had shown him.

Isaac was part of his life now and Ryan wasn't about to give that up. He had intentions of making sure the boy was always on the right track.

Taylor had to admit that she had admired Ryan for doing that. For the next few years, the three had live together, like a family.

Then, one week ago, Ryan and Taylor had decided that they officially wanted to make the three of them family.

They had talked it over for a while about adopting Isaac. It was an idea that Taylor had brought up a while ago but there had been some problems with him so they had dropped it.

Everything had settled and they were all happy. It was the next step that Taylor thought they should take.

Ryan had a different step in mind though.

He had proposed to her. It was a sporadic moment, something Taylor had never been expecting. But it had happened and she had accepted. She had already started to think about their wedding when Ryan mentioned something about eloping.

At first Taylor had started to object. Then she realized that was what she wanted to do.

Because that was just how they were.

Taylor caught Ryan's eye once again and saw him smile at her before going back to his conversation with Seth. She sighed. How come he wasn't facing the anticipation of telling everyone about their marriage?

Unless…unless he was regretting the marriage. Maybe that's why he didn't want to tell anyone. He was going to tell her that it wasn't working out and then break her heart all over again.

She stood up and went right over to Ryan. "Hey, can I talk to you for a minute? In private?"

Seth waved them on. "Go ahead. Summer's been calling me for the last ten minutes about doing something or other, so she's probably already really pissed at me. I should probably go check that out."

Seth left them alone. Taylor turned to look at Ryan and was about to say something to him when he kissed her instead.

"Look, I know that you're worrying about me not wanting to tell everyone right now. You're probably thinking I'm having regrets or something."

Taylor looked at the ground sheepishly. "Um…no. Me? Think that? Never."

"Uh-huh, you just keep telling yourself that." Ryan gave her a playful smirk.

She sighed, happy to know that she was just over thinking things. She was glad that Ryan could tell everything that she was thinking and that he was able to deny all of her concerns before they were even voiced.

"Are we going to say something when Sandy and Kirsten get here?" she asked anxiously.

"Yes. I just want to tell them all together. I think that they all deserve to hear it at once."

Taylor nodded her head, agreeing with him. As anxious as she was, she knew she was going to have to wait just a little bit longer. "I'm going to go back over there okay?"

Ryan gave her a quick kiss before she walked away. She couldn't remember a time when she was happier.

Because she was truly in love.

* * *

"Taylor, I need to talk to you for a minute inside." Summer went over to her best friend. "I need help with the cake."

"Okay." Taylor followed her inside to the kitchen. She started to pick up the cake when Summer stopped her.

"Okay, I lied. I just really needed to talk to you about something."

"What?"

"Are you and Ryan like breaking up or something like that?"

"Wh-what? Where you would get an idea like that?"

"You two have barely been talking to each other tonight. And that's a sign that there are problems and inevitably that leads to breaking up. And you two can't do that."

"Summer-"

"Because seriously, Taylor you two have true love, I can totally tell. And I've seen true love die too many times when it deserves to be alive. And that's totally true for you two. Your love cannot die. I will not let it die. I'm serious on that too."

"Sum-"

"I will force you two together in a room for 24 hours or however long it takes until you guys make up and come out all lovey-dovey. Got it?"

"Summer first of all, Seth has rubbed off on you a little too much."

Summer glared at her. "I resent that."

"And second of all, Ryan and I are not breaking up. No, we're definitely no where near there."

"Then…then what is going on? There is something and you cannot deny that fact."

Taylor bit her lip, contemplating this for a minute. She could lie and then have Summer kill her later for not saying anything or she could tell the truth.

She was always more partial to telling the truth. Plus, she needed to tell someone.

"We're married."

"You're what now?"

"We eloped last week."

Summer let out a squeal, hugging Taylor tightly. "Why didn't you tell me? And why wasn't I invited along or something?"

"Well, that would have ruined the whole point of eloping. We were going to tell everyone when Sandy and Kirsten got here. I've been bursting holding this in. You're the only one who knows though, besides Isaac. Don't say anything until we tell everyone."

"I'm so happy for you two! I always knew that you would end up getting married. See, I told you it was true love." Satisfied that they were not breaking up, Summer picked up the cake and went outside.

Taylor was shaking her head, laughing at Summer. She was also smiling though.

Because Summer was right; it was true love.

* * *

Taylor laid her head against the pillow, smiling at Ryan, who was already almost asleep. She gave him a quick kiss on the cheek before turning off the light.

"Are you glad that we told everyone?" Ryan's voice broke through the silence that had come over the room.

"Yes. Now I'm no longer bursting to tell everyone."

Sandy and Kirsten had arrived at the party much later than anticipated, but they had still gotten there. Ryan and Taylor had been able to make their announcement. Everyone had been happy for them and glad that they had finally gotten married, everyone had agreed it should have happened long ago. Though Kirsten was a little disappointed that she hadn't gotten to be there, they agreed to let her throw them a party to make up for it. She had been very satisfied with that.

All in all, Taylor was glad that she finally was able to tell everyone. Now she could admit to the world that she was no longer Taylor Townsend but Taylor Atwood. She could admit to everyone that she was going to be with Ryan for the rest of her life.

Because that was all she had ever wanted in her life; to be married to her true love.


End file.
